Goodnight, Ghost
by Inspirationally Red
Summary: Matthew never wanted to stay at his stepfather Ludwig Beilschmidt's house. That changed when, one night, he saw the ghost of a man who called himself Prussia. Modern AU, PruCan, GerIta, Goth!FACE Family, ON HIATUS
1. Chapter 1

**-Goodnight, Ghost-**

**Chapter One**

It was a truth unofficially recognized in schools the world over that when you are in a classroom last period on a Friday, time moves in ways Einstein would never have imagined. Matthew had been watching the clock like a hawk for the past fifteen minutes, and he could have sworn the larger hand never budged from its resolute position over the one.

He would most likely have continued staring had Ivan not tapped him on the shoulder. "Give it up, Matvey, that clock doesn't work, remember?" The broad-shouldered teenager's breath tickled his ear, Russian accent rendering every syllable clipped and Bond-villainesque. Unfortunately the broad-shouldered teenager had never been particularly adept at whispering, so his voice carried across the entire classroom.

"Matthew! Overlooking how you're clearly not paying attention, run for your life! It's the Soviet Union!" Professeur Carriedo called from the front of the classroom.

The World History class of Pulchra Mundi Collège exploded into laughter. Even Ivan, who normally slumped back into his seat with an irritated huff at Professeur Carriedo's sometimes tactless jokes, chuckled. Professeur Carriedo was a self-proclaimed 'education artist', and insisted in referring to them all as children despite the fact that the majority of the students in Pulchra Mundi Collége history class were all nearing eighteen years of age. A tiny Spaniard with more presence than a bad-tempered lion in a small room, he had a perchance for clarifying his explanations with elaborate hand gestures that would put an Italian to shame. That was precisely why they all liked him so much.

"Since you were obviously enraptured by all this, you can probably give me a speech worthy of an orator on who the Teutonic Knights were," Professeur Carriedo smiled winningly at the blonde.

The question momentarily stumped Matthew until Ekaterina piped up from his left-hand side. "That's not fair, he was watching the clock!"

It was a testament to Professeur Carriedo's reputation as one of the friendliest teachers in Pulchra Mundi High that he didn't snap back at the exuberant girl. "And so am I, I want to get home to marking mountains of essays, because I love teaching _so _much." At this, more laughter ran across the class. Professeur Carriedo quelled it all with a single cock of his eyebrow before continuing, pacing the length of the room to survey the class with hawk-like eyes. "Seriously guys, it's a new term, we've only just started learning about the Teutonic Knights and I come in here to find you're all sittingupthebackplayingyourDSthankyouverymuchI'llt akethatKiku." The teacher's words disintegrated into a rush of breath as he whipped the reprobate game console out of the student's hands. The offender was a Japanese teenager renowned throughout the school as being able to hack almost anything from computers to traffic lights, and went by the name of Kiku Honda, because of his love for his father's Honda Civic. Matthew had always thought Kiku looked almost disturbingly like some sort of rodent; the scrawny Japanese boy was always dressed in an oversized black jumper hiked to knobs at his bony elbows, with a clearly visible sprinkling of dandruff across his thin shoulders. Kiku now glared up at Mr Carriedo through greasy black strands of hair before whipping his head back down to glower at the desk.

"He loves me," Professeur Carriedo said genially, rousing a scream of laughter from the Hungarian girl Erzsébet and a barely discernible squirm from Kiku, which set the whole class off again.

"Anyway, enough of the theatrics, children." Professeur Carriedo clapped his hands, apparently under the impression that it would restore order to the class. "So," he said once the rowdiness had abated, "can _anybody _tell me who the Teutonic Knights were?"

Ekaterina's fist hit the air so fast Matthew was surprised there wasn't an audible noise. "They were a German order." She faltered under the teacher's gaze, mind clearly working. "Weren't they?"

"No, because you're _always_ wrong," Professeur Carriedo affected a long-suffering expression, then grinned at Ekaterina to show he was joking. His polished black shoes glistened in the light as he swung past their desk, continuing in his patrol up and down the classroom. "Correct, Ekaterina, the Teutonic Knights were a German Order. Interestingly enough, the Teutoni was also the name of a Germanic tribe around about the time of Ancient Rome…" Professeur Carriedo paused for a moment, thinking, then continued, a grin breaking through onto his olive face as he addressed the class. "Can anybody tell me what their full name was? That's the Teutonic Knights, not the Germanic tribe."

Silence.

"Maybe some wise soul who takes German can tell me what the German name is?" Professeur Carriedo asked sweetly.

A fist rose tentatively into the air at the back of the class. Matthew quickly identified the large hand as belonging to the Swiss youth, Vasche Zwingli. A stickler for rules and responsibilities, Matthew had always felt foolish and overawed in the presence of the uptight boy, his predicament only made worst by Vasche's harsh accent. "Orden auf die Brüdern von Deutschen Haus auf St. Mariens im Jerusalem."

"Well done!" Professeur Carriedo said enthusiastically, clapping hard. The class burst into applause. Vasche reddened slightly and sank back into his seat.

"Yes, another name for the Teutonic Knights was the…" Professeur Carriedo paused briefly, then gestured at Vasche, "whatever he said." Several people laughed. "They were a medieval German military order, and primarily Catholic. It was formed to aid pilgrims on their quest to reach the Holy Land. The Crusades, remember? We covered them last term."

"First Crusade, achieved absolutely nothing!" Laura spoke up eagerly from the back of the class. Matthew swivelled in his seat to regard her, as did several others in his vicinity. The Belgian girl's eyes were shining as she leant forward across the table to better address the class. "Second Crusade, achieved absolutely nothing, Third…"

"Third Crusade, achieved absolutely nothing. Undoubtedly learnt from Horrible Histories," said Professeur Carriedo.

They all laughed, and Ekaterina piped up eagerly. "I love that show!"

"High-five!" Matthew traded high-fives with her.

"The bell's going to go." Ivan's voice was so quiet for a second Matthew thought he had imagined it.

"Right," beamed Professeur Carriedo as they began packing up their textbooks (unopened, as they had been for the entire lesson). "Homework: learn how to pronounce the full name of the Teutonic Order as well as Vasche." Yet another smattering of laughter ran around the class. "Kiku, you'll have to stay behind with me after class."

The expression on Kiku's face was positively delighted; a very odd expression for somebody who had been caught playing games literally right under the teacher's nose. Matthew raised an eyebrow at him, but the Japanese student ducked out of sight to retrieve a folder that had fallen on the floor, avoiding the blonde's gaze.

Ivan rapped his knuckles playfully on the side on Matthew's head as the last peals from the school bell faded into silence. "Come on, Matvey, we're going to miss the train."

Matthew dodged under the Russian youth's arm, snatching up his notes where they had been discarded on the desk. "I'm coming, I'm coming. Hey, Kat, did you get the notes we had to put down in Chemistry?"

Ekaterina nodded, slinging her brightly-patterned schoolbag over her shoulder. "I'll email them to you."

"Thank you," Matthew breathed, shouldering his backpack. Pulchra Mundi Collége had a vast music and sport curriculum, so much so that it was possible to arrange for school-run music lessons during classes; Matthew had been embroiled in a difficult Bach piano concerto halfway through third period Chemistry.

Bags slung over respective shoulders, the three friends rounded the corner and stepped into the hallway. On their left, glass windows stretched from the ceiling to the polished wooden floor. Afternoon sunlight spilled in from outdoors, drenching the hallway in a golden glow.

Ekaterina was chattering away about the respective merits of various elective subjects, to which Matthew was only paying slight attention. Eventually it became clear Ivan was too; it was only when Ekaterina waved a hand in front of her brother's face that they both snapped to attention.

"Gaah!" Ivan spluttered as a pink-nailed hand was brandished in front of his nose.

"Hey, Kat!" Matthew yelped, ducking Ekaterina's attempted lunge at him.

"You're not listening!" Ekaterina put her hands on her hips.

"But Ekat, I'm tired." Matthew whined. Although he stayed silent, Ivan echoed his sentiment with a series of vigorous nods.

Ekaterina swiped at him again, face rapidly transforming into a glare. "Don't call me Ekat! It's Kat or Ekaterina!"

Matthew flung up his hands, feeling as he often did when confronted with the finer points of being best friends with several Slavics. "But I can't pronounce Ekate… Ekat…" his face screwed up in a grimace as he attempted to pronounce the unwieldy name, running through all possible variations.

"Just call her Kat, Matvey." Ivan sounded tired.

Ekaterina looked worried, and instantly slung an arm around her brother's waist. "What's wrong, bratishka?"

The muscular Russian yawned and rumpled his pale blonde hair. "I'm just tired. I have a lot of homework."

"Me too." Matthew groaned. A thought occurred to him, and he asked, stopping halfway down the corridor. "Hey, aren't you guys supposed to pick up Natalya?"

"She has piano lessons on Fridays." Ekaterina informed him, while Ivan openly quailed at the thought of his clingy younger sister. Ivan had made it clear ever since Matthew had first met him that Natalya's open idolisation of her older brother was completely one-sided, but that didn't stop Matthew from wondering whether it would count as one-sided incest. Natalya certainly seemed to have no qualms about it.

Ivan glanced at him. "What about you? Don't you work after school on Fridays?"

The shop was called the Occult Medallion, self-run by the Bonnefoye-Kirkland family, and in Ivan's eyes they almost deserved it too. Not only did Matthew's family run an occult shop, the taste of said family would be enough to scare even the most sceptical cynic. There was Arthur Kirkland with all his 80's-punk/Siouxsie-Sioux-esque clothing, and his son Alfred with his beloved black bomber jacket and numerous skull ear piercings.

Matthew shook his head. "No."

Ekaterina shivered. "I should hope not, your shop's scary."

"I think it's cool," Ivan grinned at him. Their footsteps clattered against the polished floorboards as they quickened their pace through the hallway, towards the door at the far end. "Your dad, did he choose the design himself?"

"Yes. He drew it himself. The skulls on the banisters were his design, and so were the gargoyles on the roof and the skeleton wallpaper…" Matthew grinned.

"Okay, enough!" Ekaterina squealed, covering her head with her hands. "If this is to get me back because I was talking about Commerce and Design earlier, I take it back; Professeur Hardinge isn't mean after all…"

"Hey, Matvey, isn't that your brother?" Ivan pointed.

They had emerged into the oval. Tall, shady trees had lined the expanse of neatly trimmed green grass for as long as Matthew could remember, blocking the sky with their broad leaves. Now that autumn had exploded onto the scene in a rush, even the drabbest trees sported foliage shot through with lustrous orange and vivid ruby, boasting crowns of pale gold or deep brown.

Matthew squinted across the oval. "Oh, yeah, there he is."

To look at, Alfred and Matthew couldn't have been more different. Not only was Alfred's style vastly different from his own, there had also been language differences when Matthew had first arrived at the Kirkland's house. Being the adopted American son of an eccentric homosexual English occultist, English, obviously, was their spoken language, which, to a boy who had been speaking either French or Italian his whole life and had only learnt English in school, was nothing short of terrifying. The reverse was true for Alfred - while completely fluent in English, François had threatened Arthur with impalement if he did not attempt to converse with his son in 'a more cultured language', aka French.

Thus Alfred's difficulties. Pulchra Mundi Collége was a French nondenominational, international, English-speaking private school on the border of Burgundy and Lorraine that placed great store in being fluent in at least two languages by the time you were eighteen years old. So far, Alfred was seventeen, and currently doing as badly at French as he was at Japanese. Which was quite strange, considering they lived in France, but if it was one thing Matthew knew Alfred would do badly at no matter how many months preparation it was anything to do with geography or languages.

Fortunately Matthew had been spared any embarrassment by taking a class he knew he'd fail (speaking it at home, Matthew had discovered, was actually quite an effective way of learning English), so he was currently taking accelerated Italian and working on German, which he quite enjoyed.

Yet life at Pulchra Mundi Collége was not all 'hamburgers and heroes', as Alfred liked to say. There was their markedly different fashion sense to the rest of their peers - while the majority of students were fairly open-minded and inclusive of the myriad of different fashion tastes, Arthur had threatened them both with a month of scouring the attic for demons if either of them came home sporting the latest designer clothes. So Alfred stuck to his piercings and jacket, and Matthew to his black skinny jeans, and the odd looks they had to endure each day increased markedly as each year went on.

Ekaterina followed the blonde youth's gaze, a frown furrowing her face. "Isn't that Kiku?"

So it was. Alfred didn't share History with Kiku, and the scrawny Japanese student gave no outward indication he was meant to be in detention. Watching as Alfred's head bent to better catch Kiku's words, Matthew felt a pang of worry twist at his heart. Normally, students only came to Kiku when they wanted something to be hacked or stolen – the boy had been in more detentions than Matthew could properly keep count. Before this day, Alfred hadn't given any sign he even knew the Japanese boy, so what could he possibly want from him?

Ivan looked bemused. "I didn't know they knew each other."

Matthew felt unsettled. "Yeah, neither did I." Quickening his pace, Matthew strode towards his step-brother with more haste than perhaps necessary, waving his arms to attract Alfred's attention. "Hey, Al!"

"Kore wa Tanaka san no noto desu." Alfred was explaining to Kiku. Then his head swivelled in his step-brother's direction, blue eyes widening behind his glasses. "What are you doing here?" he demanded, switching rapidly to English as he shoved a small black notebook at Kiku.

Matthew stopped, feeling slightly insulted. Ivan and Ekaterina hovered behind him a little distance away, talking in low voices between themselves in Russian. "I just… are you ready to go?"

"Go?" Alfred sounded incredulous. "With you? Are you nuts?" Leaning over, he picked up his bag and slung it over his shoulder. "I'm going with Kiku."

"Going? Going where?" Matthew demanded, beginning to feel slightly panicked at the thought of what Arthur would say to him if he returned home without his step-brother.

Alfred made an impatient gesture. "Where does it look like? Out." To Kiku, he added, quickly switching to Japanese with a fluidity Matthew hadn't known he possessed. "Ikimashou."

"Wait!" Matthew yelped as Alfred and Kiku began moving away. Kiku uttered a short, impatient grunt and Alfred crossed his arms, staring pointedly at his step-brother. The black bomber jacket and skull earrings seemed all the more menacing as they caught the light and glittered.

"_What?_"

Matthew said weakly. "It's just… if you're going somewhere, what time will you come home?" Matthew's voice rose in volume. "Arthur'll flip out if he doesn't know where you are, and Papa…"

"Okay, okay." Alfred sighed and considered, tilting his head to one side as he always did when thinking. "I'll probably get back around six."

"It's a waste of time asking you whereyou're going, isn't it?" ventured Matthew as Kiku picked up his bag and Alfred moved to his side.

"Yep." Alfred fiddled with the shoulder strap of his bag, avoiding his step-brother's gaze. "Just say I'm at a basketball game or something. I'll see you at six, Matt."

"Yeah, see you." Matthew muttered, watching as they walked away, Kiku's greasy hair bouncing around his face, Alfred striding towards the school gates with long, confident steps. He mentally made a note that this was the sixth time he'd had to cover up for Alfred's absence this week, and sighed. Lately Alfred had taken to sneaking off after school hours with all manner of different people. Matthew found himself quietly thanking how Arthur seemed to pay little or no interest in his son's school activities, claiming it was all 'part of a conformist system', which made it easy to say Alfred was spending his time away at various sport matches. François, on the other hand, was slightly more difficult to fool, possessing an abundance of almost motherly concern towards his step-son, and it was only Matthew's quick imagination that had gotten Alfred this far undetected.

It worried Matthew, not knowing what Alfred was up to. For all he knew, judging by the types of people he seemed to sneak off with – Kiku, for one, and once even Natalya – Alfred might very well be dealing drugs, and it was only Herculaneun force of will that prevented Matthew from combing Alfred's room for the fourth time. The first, second and third attempt had revealed no sign of any illegal substances whatsoever, but that didn't limit the possibilities. Alfred showed no sign that what he was doing was of any real importance, so Matthew had come to accept that these outings were simply a normal case of a teenager wanting to hang out with his friends after school.

"No offense," Ivan said as he walked up to him, Ekaterina following in his wake. "But your brother's weird."

Matthew rolled his eyes and grinned easily up at the towering Russian, his worries quickly smoothing back into placidity at his friend's violet-blue gaze. "Aren't we all?"

This seemed to amuse Ekaterina immensely; she wouldn't stop chuckling even when they had walked out of the school gates and boarded the bus that stopped at the end of the road.

Matthew's head snapped up, eyes widening at the sight of the approaching bus. "Whoops, that my bus. See you, guys." The Bonnefoye-Kirkland had a house above the Occult Medallion, yet the small occult shop was situated in the fringes of the inner city, far out of reach of any of the normal bus lines his schoolmates normally frequented.

"Bye, Matt." His friends chorused.

"I'll text you," Ivan promised.

The bus, three minutes late, creaked to a stop in front of him. Its automatic door scraped unpleasantly against the stairs as it opened. Pointedly ignoring the bus driver eyeing his distressed black jeans and studded shirt, Matthew fed his coins into the meter and shuffled toward the back of the bus.

An old woman absorbed in a battered paperback sat in a seat roughly to the middle of the bus and didn't look up when Matthew passed. The only other passenger on the bus was a middle-aged man in a neatly pressed suit, who thumbed at his iPhone and nodded politely to him. The blond clumped up the aisle to the empty back seats and threw himself down onto the plastic seat.

Matthew slid over to the window. The bus's halogen lights flung the scratches and fingerprints on the glass's surface into high relief. Idly, he tucked a hand into his pocket and traced the cracks running over the back of his cell phone. He'd received a text from François; the neon letters still gleamed brightly on the abused screen.

**Salut chère, comment était ta journée? Nous allons à la maison de Felicia demain. ****Fais tes bagages pour le weekend :P**

It took his brain several moments to remember the French, but once he did, Matthew sat back, feeling slightly taken aback at the suddenness of the news. The weekly visit to Felicia's house was nothing but expected, yet it still startled him. He hadn't expected it to be coming up so soon.

A suave Parisian model, François Bonnefoye had found himself divorced after his wife and Matthew's mother, an Italian woman named Felicia, had decided she was uncomfortable living with a bisexual man. François held no grudges against her for the incident, and had impressed upon Matthew not to do the same. After several months, François had eventually met and fallen in love with the English occultist Arthur Kirkland. After living with the Kirklands and all their bohemian eccentricities for so long, the time Matthew had spent with Felicia seemed pale in comparison. His time with Felicia had seemed bland and numb, and the strangeness he had encountered with the Kirklands was exactly the type of exciting shock his system had needed.

_Don't panic, it's only for a weekend. _Matthew comforted himself. His breath misted against the cold glass. _Plus, you've done this before. It's not like this visit will be any different. _

He shoved his phone back into his pocket and stared out, watching himself where the halogen glare turned the window into a mirror.


	2. Chapter 2

**-Goodnight, Ghost-**

**Chapter Two **

The bus rattled to a halt, doors wheezing open like an old man with pneumonia, and Matthew gratefully exited. The all-encompassing, lingering stench of ammonia that had seemed to fill the bus was snatched away by a stray gust of wind, flinging it far away, where the city of Dijon honked and rattled its way towards another evening.

The sun was bleeding red all over the houses, the lengthening shadows sprouting thickly along the pavement, dispersed only by the neon glow of many shop windows. Matthew loved Dijon in the evening. The city's daytime industriousness slowed to a thin trickle; cars and buses slowly trundled their way down the cobbled streets, disgorging a colourful collection of people from their bellies. Steeply pitched rooftops reached their way up into a darkening sky, enveloping Matthew with an immense feeling of comfort and intimacy with the old city. The lanterns mounted on each house had been lit on each side of the street, painting the weathered stone walls in loving washes of pale gold, pinkish-white, brown and pale lavender. All he needed was a busker playing an accordion, and Matthew might as well have been in a movie.

He loved France.

People were walking and running down the street, tired, haggard faces lit by the sickly glow from the shop windows, bags and briefcases swinging from shoulders and hands. Matthew wondered where they had gone to make them so tired, what on earth they could have possibly done to exhaust them so much by the end of the day. For surely, in a city that looked as though it had waltzed straight from the pages of a fairytale, there was nothing that could possibly be a source of stress.

Lengthening shadows were gathering, clustering thickly to the footpaths, and Matthew almost thought he could see glinting eyes in the darkness and sharp claws. These brief glimpses caught at the back of his throat, filling it with a, waxy orange taste. Matthew had never been as adept as seeing The Unseen as Arthur or Alfred; the normally crystal clear sightings of his foster family were restricted to the strange flashes of sight and taste. Matthew had had these as soon as he had set foot over the threshold of the Occult Medallion; the strange, intangible magic of the place seeping into his veins and driving splinters through his heart.

A crow ruffled its feathers and uttered a sharp cry from where it perched on top of a streetlamp; Matthew jumped out of his reverie with a jolt, startled. A bus driving dangerously close to the curb kicked up a spray of dirty rainwater left over from last night's downpour; Matthew yelped and jumped clear of the water.

_It's my lucky day, isn't it, _he thought, wringing the hem of his black shirt free of the water.

The Occult Medallion was a tall black building hunched roughly at the corner of the street, scowling at all pedestrians that passed. All those who came beneath the building's vast shadow almost instantly shivered and hurried away, the indefinable chill they felt evident in their turned-up collars and quickened footsteps. Those curious enough only lingered briefly, eyes scanning the velvet-swathed window displays before their lips crinkled in bemused smiles and they went on their way.

_It's a wonder we stay in business,_ Matthew thought as he started towards it. Matthew knew the bulk of the customers – Arthur's customers normally; they never trusted anyone else – always seemed to show up at night, creeping inside in the late hours of the evening, footsteps quiet and hurried against the dark wooden floorboards, eyes narrowed and darting as they handed over the money and disappeared into the darkness. Arthur also seemed to have a wide extended family that all seemed to come requesting any and all variety of hexes; Arthur normally retreated, cursing, into the back room whenever they showed up at the door of the Occult Medallion, leaving François to attend to the charming brown-haired man who sang like an angel and had given Alfred a stuffed toy sheep as a gift after his sixth visit. When Matthew had asked Arthur who the man was, he'd answered it was his brother, Gwynn, a Welshman who studied various aspects of Celtic legends.

The stone gargoyles beamed down at him from the steeply-pitched roof as he approached the door; people had always told him they looked creepy, but Matthew had always found the stone denizen's toothy grins hilarious. He'd affectionately named them all; the masculine one with the crooked half-moon spectacles was Berwald, the one tilting its head confusedly to one side was Eirikur, the one brandishing a sceptre with a goofy grin on its face was Mathias, and the one tearing at a cross with its claws was Lukas.

"Good afternoon," Matthew mouthed at them as he reached for the doorknob. The lock protested as he turned the key, door opening with a harsh squeal of rusted hinges.

_Alfred forgot to oil it again, _Matthew thought, and made a mental note to remind him.

The Occult Medallion was a low-ceilinged, dimly-lit room; the Bonnefoye-Kirkland's lived in a flat above the shop, accessible from the first floor by a long, winding staircase. Matthew had fallen in the love with the staircase from the first moment he had seen it; the staircase was a massive structure built out of deep brown hawthorn wood. Faeries and other mythical creatures had been carved into the wood with exquisite detail, a long parade climbing up the curving banister. Every figure had a distinctive face and build, the light from the various lanterns hung around the room casting dappled shadows over the faeries. Matthew had photographed the colossal piece countless times for his Photography classes.

"He…" he began, but fell silent when he realized the shop wasn't as deserted as he'd originally thought. A tall man was talking to a smaller, tow-headed figure reclining back in a comfortable green Victorian armchair behind the counter – Matthew's stepfather.

One only had to look at Arthur Kirkland to either back away or, if one was particularly brave, venture up and inquire about the state of his clothes. The only thing familiar about him today was his scowl, but that was normal – Matthew's stepfather changed clothes almost hourly, which, now that Matthew thought about it, was probably only to be expected, being the husband of a model. Today he was wearing tight black leather trousers with what Matthew counted to be no less than fourteen buckles running up along the legs. He was wearing a black leather jacket so large and so hung with various metal amulets it looked positively misshapen, with sleeves so wide he could easily have stuffed half a country in there. Completing the ensemble was heavy black eyeliner, vivid purple contact lenses, and white-blonde hair spiked high with gel, with a single, alarming strip of electric blue running parallel to the scalp.

_He's going to start a riot one day, _Matthew thought, turning his attention to the stranger.

The stranger was tall, lean, and seemed almost wolfish the way his body arched over the countertop. His rangy build was partly smothered in the folds of a dark brown leather coat, and a long ponytail of red hair dripped down his back. When Matthew looked closely, he could just make out what looked like a silver Celtic cross earring and boots made of, not leather, but actual crocodile hide.

_There's no other word for it,_ Matthew decided as the stranger's eyes turned on him, _this guy's cool. _

The stranger's olive-green eyes crinkled at the corners. His mouth twisted in a rumpled crease as he opened his mouth, seeming to chew slowly on the words before spitting them out. His accent was strange and mangled the French words; Irish, maybe, or Scottish.

"And who is this?"

Arthur's acid-green eyes bulleted through the dimness towards his stepson, and his shoulders slumped. "Ah. Alasdair, this is my stepson, Matthew. Matthew, this is my brother, Alasdair."

"Fair job ye've done on him, Art." Alasdair's grin was an almost alarming flash of white teeth as he reached inside his coat. "Reckon he's almost starting t' look like you now." He chortled and, right before Matthew's eyes, fished a crumpled cigarette and a red lighter from his coat and flipped the cap.

"He's François' son," Arthur explained, coming around the countertop. His long arm unfolded, fingers poised to snatch the cigarette out of Alasdair's mouth. "And we don't smoke in here."

Alasdair ducked under his arm, red hair trailing out behind him as he stepped quickly backwards. "Just a wee cig, Artie, won't do a'body any harm." He winked at Matthew, acting as if he'd known him personally for years and, despite himself, Matthew found himself slowly beginning to warm to the older man. Alasdair spoke curiously in between drags on the cigarette. "What year are ye now, lad?"

"I'm seventeen, I'm in the lycée." Matthew answered, glancing quickly at Arthur. His stepfather had sunk back down into the chair, listening to the conversation with an unreadable expression. Occasionally he could wrinkle his nose, cough quietly, and wave the cigarette smoke away.

Alasdair's smile broadened, as though he was laughing at some small, private joke. "Well done." He glanced at his watch, then at Arthur. "I'd best be off. You'll have it ready for me?"

"I'll call you." Arthur promised.

Alasdair smiled lazily. "Thank ye." He moved to walk out the door, ruffling Matthew's hair as he passed. "I'll see y'around, Mattie."

Matthew blinked. "Umm… yeah, see you." He watched the man disappear behind the tinted glass, then whirled around to face Arthur. "Okay, who was _he?" _

"I told you, he's my brother." Arthur was mopping up a suspicious-looking red stain on the countertop with a rag he kept in the second drawer for such purposes, and avoided his stepson's gaze.

Matthew moved to help him. "Why was he here?"

"He wanted a spell that would stop an infestation of ghouls wandering around his attic," Arthur answered, a little too quickly. His acid-green eyes ran up and down his stepson's frame before riveting to his side, where Alfred normally lingered. "Where's Alfred?" he demanded.

Matthew tensed, thoughts of Alasdair flying from his head. "At basketball practice," he answered in English, fingers slowly curling into his palms. A small part of him marvelled at how easy it had become to lie. "He won't be back until six."

Arthur's shoulders slumped. "Bloody conformist systems," he muttered, raking a black-nailed hand through his hair. His eyes darted to Matthew's face, fixing him in place with a pair of acid-green eyes. "What took you so long to get home?"

Matthew sighed. "Arth… Dad, I take the bus. It takes a while."

"Huh." Arthur grunted sceptically, rasping the cloth across the counter.

"Where's Papa?" Matthew asked as he passed.

Arthur's eyebrows lifted. The scrubbing stopped momentarily. "François' out at a photoshoot. Don't leave your bag lying around in the hall!" he called as Matthew walked past him to the staircase.

The spiral staircase seemed impossibly high and dizzying in its never-ending loops, and he barely managed to stagger his way up them. Matthew's boots thumped out their familiar tattoo against the carpeted floor as he staggered down the hallway, emerging into the wide, open kitchen. The kitchen was cold and unlit, and Matthew let out an irritated huff, pressing one hand wearily against the lightswitch as he passed. The resulting blaze of bright yellow light made him scrunch up his eyes as he navigated his way across the kitchen counter, dumping his bag onto the smooth stone surface without ceremony.

Snatching an apple from the fruit bowl, Matthew made his way towards the stairs at the far end of the kitchen. Matthew could barely manage undoing the many bolts and locks that lined the doorframe of his room, his fingers fumbling and bumping blindly against the metal in his tiredness. Finally finished, Matthew heaved opened the door and proceeded to stumble over to his bed.

The room he shared with Alfred was cramped, rectangular and narrow, with creamy-yellow painted walls. The walls were hung with a number of faded posters, depicting members of various bands, TV shows and a corkboard cluttered with various spotted Polaroids Alfred had delighted in captioning. A small window at the far end was lined with bright blue curtains, successfully restricting a view into the cobbled streets beyond, the dark brown window-frame hung with a row of lanterns he'd purchased at a market. A towering bunk bed overflowing with a jumble of tangled blankets was pushed back against the wall, opposite a low cupboard for various clothes and other memorabilia. The pale wood surface of the cupboard was cluttered with a variety of small figurines, books and photos.

Matthew flopped down onto his position on the bottom bunk, feeling the mattress sink several inches in reaction to his weight. Nestling on the pillow beside him was a white stuffed toy polar bear; Matthew stared at it for approximately ten seconds before scooping it up.

"Kumajirou!" Felicia had gotten the toy for him for his fourth birthday. A fluffy white toy polar bear that said 'Who are you?' in a metallic voice every time you pressed its right paw, Matthew had had it ever since.

Hugging the bear close, Matthew cast him head back and stared at the underside of the top bunk bed, counting the number of bedsprings. He lay there, listening to the distant rumble of traffic outside, occasionally taking a bite out of his apple.

Then his phone rang.

He lay there for a long moment, loathe to move now that he'd found a comfortable position, until the insistent ringtone prompted him. Rescuing his iPhone from the depths of his pocket, he answered.

"Hello?"

"Bonjour, Matthieu," François's voice was soft, whispery and velvet-like – a fitting tone for a model.

Matthew switched to French. "Hello, Papa." He flicked a stray thread off the knee of his jeans, cradling the phone close to his ear.

"Have you packed for the trip yet?"

Matthew sat up so suddenly his head cracked into the underside of the top bunk, apple lying suddenly abandoned on the pillow next to him. "Ouch!"

"What?" François's voice switched from warm to concerned in an instant.

Matthew winced and ducked out from underneath the bunk, rubbing his head where the metal had collided. "Nothing, sorry, I just banged my head. You were saying?"

He was rewarded by a breathy chuckle. "You silly thing. I was just calling to remind you to pack for the trip. Remember, it's snowing in Montbéliard, so pack warmly."

Matthew jumped up and hurried to the cupboard. "Okay."

"Looking forward to seeing Felicia again?" François asked as Matthew opened the top drawer, wincing at the familiar, grating shriek of wood.

Matthew hesitated. "I… It feels weird." He worked methodically from the top drawer down; a collection of shirts, socks, clean underwear, scarves, jumpers, hats and jeans were all unceremoniously thrown into a jumble against the strewn bedcovers.

François sighed. "I know, mon chéri. It feels weird for me too."

Matthew got down on his hands and knees, groping underneath the bunk bed for a suitcase sizeable enough to contain the motley assortment of clothes he had gathered. "Do you…" it seemed rather awkward to be discussing such personal matters in such an odd position, but François's expectant silence prompted him to continue. "Do you miss her?"

François was silent for a long moment, long enough for Matthew to yank the suitcase out from the depths. "Oh, mon chéri," he sighed after what felt like eternity, and his whispery voice seemed as soft as the hiss of a candle being blown into smoke. "I miss her every day."

The phone clicked and went dead as his father disconnected.

Matthew would have called back, but a strange sense of disconnectedness seemed to have had overtaken him, disabling his ability to broach the subject with his father again. He simply had too many confused emotions where his separate families were concerned. Packing the rest of his clothes into the suitcase, as well as an assortment of books and his battered PSP, he zipped up the case and leant back against the edge of the bed, aiming his apple core into the bin and smiling inwardly as he succeeded. Casting his gaze around the room for something to do came up with nothing, so he got up and headed over to the door.

"Arthur?" he called softly in English as he edged out into the cool dimness of the landing. The thought of what his step-father would say at the sound of his given name made him stop and reiterate. "Dad?"

He could hear the sound of murmured conversation issuing from the shop downstairs; Arthur Kirkland's familiar crisp, almost regal English accent and a deeper, Scottish-accented one, one that had almost become familiar in the sparse few minutes Matthew had known it.

_Why has Alasdair come back? _Matthew thought as he hurried down the stairs.

The sound of his boots against the stairs drew the two adult's gazes towards him; Alasdair ran a hand through his hair with an effulgent laugh and a sharp-toothed grin. "I'm back!"

Matthew stopped, confused. His eyes went to Arthur's, seeking an answer. "Okay…"

"Alasdair will be staying with us for a few nights." Arthur bit out. His gaze angrily flitted sideways to his brother, who was standing there with such an expression of faux innocence on his face Matthew felt compelled to laugh.

"Umm…" Matthew swayed slightly as the tall Scotsman passed him, feeling slightly overwhelmed at the turn of events. "Why?"

"Where will I be sleeping?" Alasdair interrupted cheerfully, striding off towards the stairs as if he had been staying in the Occult Medallion all his life.

Arthur blinked, distracted, wavering between both answers. "We have a guest room upstairs…"

"Cool." Alasdair beamed, spinning around. Then his smile faded slightly; he stared at the door with a surprised expression. "Is that…"

Matthew spun around just in time to see François enter, the willowy Parisian model silhouetted against the frosted glass pane in the door. François shut the door behind him and turned around, an expression of surprise then of creeping delight spreading across his face.

"Alasdair?"

Then, right before Matthew's eyes, the Scotsman walked up to François and kissed him on the mouth.

**ooOoo**

To be continued…

Author's Note:

Sorry if this chapter ended a bit too abruptly. I've been quite busy lately, what with homework and studying for exams (damn you, Real World :P) , so I might not get to update as frequently or plan my chapters as well as I would like. Have faith though, I have every intention of trying :)

Reviews and constructive criticism are greatly appreciated.


	3. Chapter 3

**Goodnight, Ghost**

**Chapter Three**

Matthew felt as though the bottom had dropped out of his stomach. His face flamed. Arthur was frozen, looking as if he had been hit around the face with a frying pan and couldn't quite believe it had happened.

"Er… do you two know each other?" Matthew asked weakly as Alasdair and François pulled apart. François's eyes were wide; he looked as startled as his family.

"We've met," Alasdair beamed, acting as though nothing was unusual in the least. He slung an arm around the Frenchman's shoulders and Arthur let out a strangled choking sound. "I have seen you in ages, François, how long has it been?"

François disentangled himself, looking increasingly bewildered. "Umm… seven years, I think?"

Alasdair snapped his fingers in recognition. "Edinburgh, 2005!"

"Don't remind me," François groaned.

Arthur opened his mouth. Seconds later a blistering torrent of English neither François nor Matthew understood was fired at Alasdair. Alasdair responded just as quickly, with many elaborate hand gestures, thick accent rendering the words incomprehensible.

"What are they saying?" Matthew mouthed at François. François shook his head slightly, slightly cross-eyed from the effort of keeping up with the conversation.

"Something about affairs…"

"Arthur!" Alasdair threw up his hands in the universal gesture for 'Calm down'. His olive-green eyes were twitching slightly. "Just calm down, alright?"

"You waltz in here and proceed to kiss my husband, how on earth am I supposed to calm down?" Arthur's voice had the unfortunate habit of ratcheting up several octaves whenever he was under pressure; his high-pitched tone made Matthew smile in spite of himself.

Alasdair flung up his hands in frustration. "I'm not gay, I was just happy to see him, I thought you'd know that by now…"

_There are, _Matthew reflected, as he and François watched the bickering escalate with growing amusement, _some very interesting conversations you can hear when you have homosexual parents. _

After a moment watching them, François shook his head and linked his arm through his son's. "Looks like they're not going to stop any time soon. How about we go upstairs?" As Matthew stared at him, he winked. "Do you really want to stay here? You know how Arthur can get."

"I predict the forecast will be flying furniture," Matthew whispered back as they headed up the stairs, and both father and son dissolved into giggles.

To look at, François seemed the epitome of every androgynous male model Matthew had ever seen. Neat and as angular as the wing of a bird, his deep red velvet suit clung to every plane of his thin body. Wavy corn-blonde hair framed a face that seemed slightly off-centre, blurred, perhaps by the thin veneer of makeup, and set with two opaque blue sapphires that had always seemed eternally distant and sleepy, the illusion only strengthened by heavy lids. His voice was whisper-soft in contrast with his husband's, a low murmur throbbing with varying emotions, none the less stark in their intensity.

His father had always struck Matthew as a very intense individual; where Arthur shouted and blustered whenever his sons got into trouble, François murmured and mocked, words aching with a sort of disappointment, as if Matthew or Alfred had personally let him down. Perhaps this was why Matthew and Alfred were so well-behaved around him; neither of them wanted to disappoint François, to see the background of those dancing blue eyes shift and darken, to see that vaguely smiling mouth droop.

Matthew broke the brooding silence, and almost immediately wished he hadn't; his voice had always felt too loud and overbearing in contrast with his father's. "How do you know Alasdair?"

François rotated one shoulder, grimacing slightly. "He's a strange one, Alasdair. When I met him, he was one of the photographers working on my shoots, but he takes all sorts of weird jobs. I don't know what he does now." François glanced behind him. "It makes you wonder what he's doing here, huh?"

"Yeah, I know." Matthew's foot accidentally caught on one of the steps as he passed, causing him to stumble. "Arthur didn't tell me why Alasdair's staying."

"Yeah, me neither." François's frown was small, vaguely displeasured. "I'll interrogate him later. Maybe Alasdair's couch-surfing or something. As far as I know, he hasn't properly visited Arthur in years."

"Gwynn's his brother, right?" Matthew asked, remembering the brunette Celticologist who had visited the Occult Medallion several weeks ago. He winced as the bickering downstairs abruptly rose in volume and glanced with some wonder down the stairs. "That escalated quickly."

François made a small noise. "Yeah, they've never gotten on. Anyway, have you packed?"

"Yeah, I have," Matthew answered, remembering the small brown suitcase in his room. He felt a slight shiver of nerves run through him. "It'll be weird, seeing her again."

François squeezed his shoulder. "You saw her last weekend." His soft voice was gentle.

Matthew shivered. "I know, but… I don't know, something about this time feels weird." The strange waxy orange taste was lingering in his mouth, hugging his tongue, and he couldn't restrain a grimace.

"It's just tiredness." François announced, marching up the stairs with a rhythmic thump of boots against the worn wood steps. Matthew could tell by the broad, erratic sweep of his father's arms that he didn't want to pursue such topics, so he silenced himself. "I know I always become a bit paranoid when I'm tired. Anyway, we'll be leaving after dinner." Reaching the top of the stairs François stopped, blinked, then peered around. "Where's Alfred?"

Matthew checked his watch. It was five forty. "He's at basketball practice. He said he'd be home at about six." Once again, he had to marvel at his remarkable propensity towards lying – the feeling of guilt had almost completely faded away by now_. It was funny, _Matthew reflected, _how, if you repeat something long enough, it quickly loses its meaning. _

François grunted. "I worry about that boy. Too much sport can hardly be good for you."

Matthew cringed. So much for no guilt feelings. "Y… yeah."

"Hmm." François's raised eyebrow seemed to say he knew more than he let on, but he glided up the stairs without speaking. Matthew followed on behind.

"Are we driving to Montbéliard?" Matthew asked, remembering with some trepidation the Bonnefoye-Kirkland's battered brown Fiat that emitted an alarming screeching noise every time you exceeded ninety kilometres an hour.

François grinned at him. "Well, it _is _a long way to walk."

"Will the car cope?" asked Matthew apprehensively.

François reeled backwards with an expression of mock horror, clutching his chest. "Ma chère, you wound me! The car's never failed us yet, don't start doubting it now!"

"Alright," Matthew laughed.

François's silvery chuckle answered him; the stick-thin model ruffled his hair with a hand. "That's the way. By the way, do you have any homework?"

"Yes," Matthew groaned, remembering the virtual mountain of various different subjects waiting for him upstairs.

François grinned. "It would be a bit awkward if you spent the entire time at Felicia's studying, hmm? Brushed up on your Italian?"

Matthew yelped. "That reminds me, I have German homework due on Monday! Excuse me…" dodging around his father, Matthew scurried towards his room at the end of the passageway.

The sun was setting behind the window in a pool of bloodied gold, rendering the bedroom in a gilt chiaroscuro. Matthew pulled up the straight-backed chair close to the desk and sat down, feeling the fabric of his shirt catch on the dents in the wood as he reached across for his laptop.

**German grammar,** he typed in. Then, on an impulse, remembering the discussion from Mr Carriedo's History lesson, **The Teutonic Order**.

What followed was a confusing hour of names Matthew had never heard of, and dates that he could never remember. Eventually, Arthur and Alasdair's bickering dwindled to a low murmur of voices, interspersed with François's soft French accent, and the clicking of Matthew's laptop keys as he worked into the evening.

**ooOOoo**

"_You know he doesn't know." _

_His voice was an uncompromising rake of icy fingernails down a blackboard, but that didn't deter him. _

"_That is almost a contradiction in terms, Alasdair." _

"_But you know." _

"_Can't we choose a better word than 'know'? You've used it two times already. How about fathom? Fathom's a nice word." He leant forward on the bed. "Just as I can't fathom you." _

_Sunlight streamed in through the high-arched window, turning the surrounding room caustic in its whiteness, and he shielded his eyes with an arm. The hem of his pale sleeve ghosted along the back of the empty standard hospital chair, trailing threads clinging to the fabric. The chair's rubber and vinyl backing had left a long black smear along the pristine white wall, dark and out of place. _

_He had kicked at it this morning. _

"_You don't have to fathom me; you just have to tell me what you know." _

"_Yes, so you can go after him, I suppose," He picked idly at his fingernails, voice belying the tone of his words, green eyes flashing hot and resentful above a mouth twisted in sudden unconcern._

_Alasdair's sigh was an electric echo within the cramped confines of the room and he leant forward, ignoring his sharp exhale at the sudden closeness. "Tell me what you know." He said, levelling his gaze into his eyes. _

"_God, I love you," he breathed, not paying any attention, words fanning his face in an eruption of cold breath. His face was radiant, alight; the almost religious ecstasy made Alasdair want to claw it off with his fingernails, and not stop until he left his face in a shrivelled, bloody mess on the tiles. _

_The sun had slashed a chunk from the sky, bleeding all over the windowframe, and the coldness of the room made his breath catch and bury itself back in his throat. In front of him, the man was grinning, and grinning like a murderer, a murderer who clenched his stick-like fingers around his throat and drew him close. _

"_Let's play a game," he purred. _

_The kiss was scalding, caustic, burning his chapped lips and sliding down his throat in an eruption as quick and as feral as a match to kerosene, ripping his throat into flames. The clash of lips disintegrated into a flurry of low groans; he angry at himself, him savage and possessive. His fingernails raked their way down Alasdair's chest, shredding the white shirt, as he drew away with eyes alight. _

"_A game, a game," he breathed, matched to the rhythm of the Scottish man's panting. His smile turned greedy, a grin stretching the contours of his face, as his eyes dripped hungrily down his body. "Oh yes…" _

_Alasdair flicked his lower lip with his tongue, producing a low groan. Alasdair's grin was suddenly warped, distorted – a million shattered remains seen upside-down through a convex lens. "No." _

_His voice was like the hiss of boiling water through the room. The murderer fell back against the bed, and Alasdair shut and locked the door. _

_And the sun kept bleeding._

**ooOOoo**

_The street heralded his arrival in a fanfare of passing cars, and Alasdair hissed to himself as he passed them by. _

"_Why, Goddamnit…" _

_The Celtic cross bounced in his right ear; he touched it briefly, passing the broad span of his thumb over the worked silver metal, recalling how his resident little 'inmate' had touched it last night. The bitter, acidic taste that rose to his throat almost made him yank it off and hurl it into the street, to get pummelled by passing cars – but the memory of the brown-haired brother, Gwynn, giving it to him stopped him, giving vent to an angry sigh. _

_He had more brothers than he knew what to do with nowadays. _

_The street comforted his shoes in a slick of icy, falling rainwater, wetting his hair and dipping long, angry red strands across the canvas of his face. He flicked them out of his eyes impatiently, gloved hand reached up to cradle the intricately worked silver doorknob. The invisible blue wards around the door hissed as he nudged them with his toe; visible only if he half-closed his eyes, there really was no separating reality and dreams nowadays…_

_He knocked. _

_The icy air was dispersed with a rush of warmth as the door was opened and he beckoned him in. _

"_Tiugainn leam." _

_He disappeared into the darkness of the corridor, but Alasdair waited outside. Patiently. He had all day._

_He reappeared moments later, bushy red hair a thicket of copper live-wire standing on end, freckled face twisting into a heavy scowl. "Know you not the Gaelic, Alasdair?"_

_His diction made him smile. That was Aengus – perpetually old-fashioned, Irish accent lending an almost lyrical lilt to his words. "I'd love to, but…" he gestured apologetically at the wards, the lines of bright, electric-blue magic running from one end of the doorframe to the other, "the wards…"_

_Aengus's face softened. "Of course." The wards were dispersed with a wave of his hand, an act that had Alasdair suitably impressed; it took a lot of skill to even attempt something like that, at least without words. _

"_What do you have for me?" Alasdair asked, stepping over the threshold. _

_Aengus's green eyes, so much like his own, stared back at him inscrutably, giving Alasdair the uncomfortably sensation as though he was being X-rayed. "Nothing. Only a referral." _

_Anger pulsed through his veins. "A referral? To who?"_

_Aengus avoided his gaze. "Your brother." From inside the pocket of his black trousers, he withdrew a small square of crumpled paper and handed it to him._

_Alasdair took it, eyes scanning the scrawled lines for a brief moment before widening. "The Occult Medallion…" he murmured. His brain ticked. "That's just a few miles away from Montbeliard, isn't it?" _

_Aengus shifted uncomfortably. "Yes." As Alasdair turned, he stopped him with a quick hand upon his arm. "While you're here, do you fancy a drink?" His green eyes stared into his. _

_Alasdair stepped back from the door, pocketing the note. "I'm in."_

**ooOOoo**

Alfred's footsteps were loud against the worn wooden boards of the porch as he walked up to the front door of the Occult Medallion, gripping hold of the banister to support himself and ignoring the stony gazes of the gargoyles. He'd shifted his bag to his other shoulder to provide some respite for his aching hip; the lack of pain was an enormous comfort as he climbed the last of the stairs. His keys jingled, sounding abnormally loud inside the silence as he twirled them absently around his index finger by the loop. He met slight resistance as the key turned, but soon the heavy green door swung open with a slither of hinges.

"I'm home!" he called, stepping into the dimly-lit house. His voice rang out flat and unanswered; it was more of a ritual than anything else. His stepfather François worked most of the day, only padding home in the early hours of the morning, having worked through most of the night in the clutter of the model industry, and Arthur never really listened to him anyway.

"How did it go?" the unemotional voice was the first thing that met his ears.

His father was standing by the table. He was in the process of eating an apple, the small red fruit looking laughably small and fragile within the cocoon of his white fingers. "How did it go?" he repeated as Alfred brushed past him. Already Alfred's fingers were clenched around the strap of his bag, his teeth descending to grit together. Alfred had never liked his father, and he couldn't remember a time when Arthur had ever really liked him. Their relationship had always been a strange passive-aggressive sort of one. Of course, it helped that his father was essentially his adoptive one – his real parents had died around about the time Alfred was three years old, of unexplained circumstances. Matthew had often likened his family relationship to a 'Harry Potter' sort of one, and loved to compare Arthur to Mrs Dursley.

"Don't ignore me!" his father's voice trailed out behind him like a ribbon as Alfred made his way past the main room of the Occult Medallion to the staircase that would lead him to the heavily locked sanctuary of his bedroom.

"Alfred!"

His father reached the door just as Alfred began locking, bolting and doing up the chains of the considerable collection of locks that ribbed the edge of his door. "Don't ignore me!" Arthur barked, holding the door open. The strength of his considerable forearm proved dominant over his son's scrawniness; Alfred's efforts to shut the door amounted to a failure.

"It went fine!" Alfred snarled at his father through the thin gap between the frame and the door, still trying unsuccessfully to heave it shut. "I got a three pointer, alright? I'm a regular basketball champ now." Taking advantage of his father's momentary distraction as he processed the sarcasm, Alfred slammed the door shut and resumed locking it.

"Hi." Matthew ventured timidly from the desk.

Alfred whirled around and proceeded to stride over to the bunkbed, hauling himself up to the top bunk in several quick movements. Alfred flopped down onto the puffy blue doona, feeling the fabric automatically puff in reaction to his weight. He lay there, listening as his father huffed on the other side of the door, the rhythmic thump of his footsteps eventually leading away from Alfred's room towards his stepfather's office on the other side of the hallway.

A door creaked open, and François's voice spilled out. François's voice was soft, elegant and well-modulated, a fitting voice for an androgynous catwalk model. "What did he say?"

His parents' next words were muffled by the closed door. Alfred sighed and sat up. A sharp thump against his left hip drew his attention to his bag, and the folders that resided in it. Having rescued his information from the intrigued grasp of his friends, Alfred had taken them home with every intention of doing exactly as Kiku had specified, but now…

"Where were you, anyway?" Matthew asked, capping a marker with a soft pop. At first sight, Alfred had instantly detested his stepbrother – he seemed too quiet, boring and disgustingly good-looking, a trait Alfred expected he had acquired from François, judging by the wavy blonde hair and weird bluey-violet eyes. Matthew was almost the antithesis of Alfred; where Alfred was loud, argumentative, and always raring for a good old fashioned punch-up, Matthew was quiet, witty, and seemed to have his nose perpetually buried in a book.

Alfred sighed and put on his headphones.

Matthew rolled his eyes, mumbled something in French and returned to his homework.

Eventually boredom won out over Green Day, and Alfred shinned down the ladder again, unhooking the headphones from his ears as he padded curiously to his stepbrother's side. "What are you doing?"

Matthew gestured at the paper with his pen, brow furrowed as he read over the smudged notes. "German homework." He answered eventually in English. "Don't suppose you'd want to help me out?"

Alfred retreated. "No way, man, I don't do German."

Matthew grinned with one of those infrequent bouts of mischievousness Alfred had come to expect from his brother. "Ich verstand. Du bist ein… Hey!" he ducked the pen Alfred had snatched from the desk and lobbed at his head; the black marker clattered onto the worn wood.

Snatching up the thrown pen as if nothing had happened, Matthew continued. "But you take Japanese, don't you? I heard you talking with Kiku earlier…"

"Yeah, well…" Alfred scuffed the toe of his battered shoe against the floorboards, deciding there was no way in hell he was going to succumb to Matthew's lousy attempt to find out what he had been doing. That was a secret he would take with him to the grave. Well, if they got it finished, that was another story, but as it didn't seem likely…

"Ça va?" Matthew asked, hearing his sigh.

Alfred raked a hand through his hair irritably. "What? I don't speak French."

Matthew flung up his hands. "Alfred, you live in France, how could you possibly not speak French?"

"I just don't. Besides, everybody speaks English to me anyway, so I don't really see the point."

"Well, I've got news for you, there's a Scottish guy called Alasdair who's going to be staying with us, and he speaks English with such a thick accent I can't understand him."

Alfred spun around to face his stepbrother. "A guy called Alasdair? Who the hell is he?"

"Don't swear," Matthew said absently, scribbling something down. "He's Arthur's brother."

"I thought that Gwynn guy was supposed to be Arthur's brother."

"He is too, and so is Alasdair."

Alfred grunted. "Got a regular kingdom holed up behind his back, does he?"

"They do seem to be from all over the United Kingdom, yeah…" Matthew murmured, eyes unfocused. After several seconds staring down at his paper, he said testily. "No, this is no good, I just can't understand this. What country was Livonia?"

"Don't ask me," Alfred muttered, not wanting to be reminded of the continual failing grades he always seemed to receive in geography and history classes. Arthur had often despaired at his lack of interest in the classics, despite Alfred making it perfectly clear his area of interest lay more in the field of mathematics and science.

"By the way, me and François are going to Montbéliard on the weekend." Matthew added, almost as an afterthought.

Alfred grunted. "So?"

Matthew's violet eyes flashed with something a lot like irritation. "It's my mum's house. I'm staying there for the weekend."

Alfred paused for a moment. "Huh." Watching his stepbrother's back as he worked soon proved to be nothing but boring, so he spun on his heel and headed for the door. Hopefully Arthur would have moved downstairs to attend customers, although Alfred thought that was unlikely. They rarely got customers in the day; occult freaks tended to creep in at night, appearing out of the gloom with weird clothes and accents, congregating in a large cluster at the Occult Medallion's front door. Once, when Alfred had stayed up long enough, he'd even caught a glimpse of what had looked like an actual vampire, with fangs and red eyes; but whenever he questioned Arthur about it, his father normally waved it aside with a disbelieving huff, pointedly ignoring the faeries tapping impatiently at the window, requesting milk.

Alfred had just taken several steps into the darkened corridor, when a voice sounded from the shadows and nearly gave him a heart attack.

"So yer th' Yank, huh?"

Bracing himself, Alfred turned slowly.

A man was leaning nonchalantly against the grey-green wallpaper, wearing the shadows comfortably. His rangy build was nestled in the folds of a long dark brown coat, despite the obvious heating, and he rolled a cigarette idly between two gloved fingers. His white teeth and silver Celtic cross earring glistened unpleasantly in the dimness, bringing to Alfred's mind the impression of a creeping shadow figure, darkness groping pale skin festering with rot in black-bar fingers. The trickster shadows offered him the confused impression of a trail of blood dripping down the shoulders of his brown coat, before Alfred realized it was only a long trail of red hair, sloppily bound and tied back. The man's smile completed the morbid ensemble, thin lips stretching wide to bear teeth in an almost Cheshire smile, deep olive-green eyes scouring the blonde boy as if evaluating him for hidden clues, mocking expression clear evidence his appearance wasn't all that was strange.

Alfred tensed in wariness, hair on the back of his neck rising in a wave of prickling so intense he felt an audible chill run up his spine. Almost without warning, the waxy-orange tasted sprang to life on his tongue, infesting his mouth in a surge of sudden taste, nearly making him gag. The temperature seemed to have lowered several degrees in the short moment, bringing Alfred's teeth down in a frenzy of chattering. Darkness festered in the corridor, making strange shapes flash at the edge of Alfred's peripheral vision; a flash of blue there, a wing there, a single bloodred eye, watching him from the shadows above serrated fangs…

The man's voice, when it came, crawled through the air, bringing back the echo of deep lochs trapped in its accent, and Alfred's teeth gritted at the sound. "Yer not like him at all, you know."

Alfred's teeth unclenched long enough for him to snap out. "Like who? Who the hell are you?"

Alasdair's teeth flashed white in the gloom of the corridor. "A friend," the Scottish man answered casually, before turning and disappearing up the corridor in a whirl of dark brown fabric.

To Be Continued...


	4. Chapter 4

**-Goodnight, Ghost-**

**Chapter Four**

Dinner was a strange affair that night. The four making up the Bonnefoye-Kirkland family clustered at one end of the polished hardwood table, watching as the tawny-haired Scotsman on the other end chattered away as though the awkward silence didn't exist.

"So, I got fired from my job," he explained earnestly, sweeping a long lock of red hair off his face. An empty tub of yoghurt sat in front of him; Alasdair had declined François's offer of fried fish, saying he didn't like the taste, instead comforting himself with the small tub and a cup of strong coffee. Now he was sitting at the table, pointedly ignoring the occasional disapproving glance thrown to him by Arthur, regaling them with a story Matthew would have found interesting were it not for the Scotsman's almost unnatural easygoingness constantly distracting him.

"My landlord kicked me out because I couldn't pay the rent, so I floated around in the Hebrides for a while before I thought I'd stop by," Alasdair tipped a wink in Arthur's direction and was promptly met with a scowl.

Alfred frowned, growing slightly cross-eyed as he thought; geography wasn't his strong point. "Where are the Hebrides?"

"Island to the west of Scotland," Alasdair explained pleasantly. Alfred's perplexed expression only deepened; knowing him, Matthew doubted he knew where Scotland was either.

Alasdair wrinkled his nose, bringing Matthew's attention back to him. The Scotsman was sprawled back in his chair, one hand supporting his chin, drumming his nails against the edge of the table with a flurry of unpleasant clicking sounds. "Trouble is, they speak a whole different language there – I had to take Scottish Gaelic courses, and that language is hell to learn."

"Really?" François looked interested. Maybe it was due to Alasdair's behaviour earlier, but the blonde Frenchman seemed to have situated himself as far away from his friend as possible. Any attempts to move closer would probably instantly be quashed, Matthew thought, noticing Arthur and Alfred sitting between the two. They were each wearing identical scowls and looked practically identical, with their dark clothes and layers of attitude. "Say something in Scottish Gaelic."

Alasdair's expression grew pained. "Oh God… okay, um…" he thought for a while, then chuckled. "Tha mo bhàta-foluaimein loma-làn easgannan."

"Wow!" Matthew's attention was completely diverted as the sound of the rolling, tumbling language. Even Alfred looked impressed. "What does that mean?"

"My hovercraft is full of eels."

Matthew frowned. "What?" He was broken off by a sudden chuckle; the table's occupants all turned to stare at Arthur, who was laughing so hard his shoulders were visibly shaking.

Seeing his brother's reaction, Alasdair grinned. "He gets it."

"Thank God you're not Hungarian!" Arthur gasped out, and then burst out laughing again.

Obviously deciding to let his husband's oddities slide, François shook his head and turned back to Alasdair as Arthur's chuckles eventually petered into silence. "How long will you be staying here, Alasdair?" he inquired.

Alasdair waved a hand nonchalantly; Alfred blinked behind his glasses as the Scotsman's hand passed dangerously near his nose. "Shouldn't be more than a couple of weeks. I've got a friend in Ireland who said he should be able to set me up with something."

Arthur frowned, rapidly recovering from his laughing fit. "Who's the friend?"

Alasdair's gaze flicked to him, and Matthew was surprised to see an edge of tension suddenly become prominent in his jaw. "You might know him. Aengus Ó Raghallaigh?"

Arthur sat back. "Angus O'Reilly? Really?" His tone was disbelieving.

"What?" François's head turned from Arthur to Alasdair and back again, searching for answers. "Who's Aengus Ó Raghallaigh?"

Arthur shifted uncomfortably, as his brother's gaze grew even more hawk-like. "Just a guy I know." He muttered. Almost habitually, he ran a black-nailed hand through his hair awkwardly. "I had a bit of a tiff with him a few years back, so we've never really been on speaking terms since." His gaze slid upwards to Alasdair's. "How… how is he?"

"He's good." Alasdair chuckled, almost in spite of himself. "Mad as a hatter, of course, but still, he's a good guy."

Matthew was intrigued. "Angus… is he Irish?"

Alasdair's gaze fled to him with something almost like surprise. "Yes, he is. That was clever of you." He said this in such a tone that indicated he hadn't expected anything so intelligent to come out of Matthew's mouth.

Matthew opened his mouth, about to reply, when he caught sight of François's expression, bit back his sentence, and sank down into his chair. Alasdair seemed determined to remain an enigma. While part of him was amused – the enigmatic personality went well with his general style – another part of the blonde boy was simply frustrated. Who was Alasdair, really? For he had a hunch that what the Scotsman had been spouting the minute he'd stepped across the threshold of the Occult Medallion wasn't the whole truth; there was a frustratingly tantalizing sense that Alasdair was keeping something hidden, hidden beneath the crawl of his words and the mocking, secret smiles he flashed whenever he thought nobody was looking.

"Matthew and I will be going to Montbéliard after dinner." François was saying, and Matthew tuned in automatically.

Alasdair's expression stayed inscrutable, but, looking at him, Matthew caught a subtle narrowing of his eyes. "Really? Why?" his voice was quiet, but something cold and hard glinted behind his words, like the concealed edge of a sword.

François shifted slightly. "My wife." His velvet voice was sad.

Alasdair's expression softened. "Felicia?"

François nodded.

Alasdair caught Matthew's glance, and smiled at him. "That's nice. Looking forward to it?"

Matthew opened his mouth, about to reply, when his attention was diverted by the arrival of several faeries.

The Bonnefoye-Kirkland's weren't exactly blind to the existence of what Arthur referred to as 'the Otherworld' – the mystical, shadowy world of strange creatures that only seemed to manifest around the Occult Medallion in the evening, drawn perhaps by the intangible feeling of magic lengthening within the shadows. It was, Matthew supposed, all part of running an Occult Shop that you became open-minded towards all aspects of the abnormal. When first moving in with the Kirklands, Matthew had been convinced his stepbrother was mad, with all his ramblings about being kept awake at night by a brownie tugging on his ears.

Yet as the months had passed and Matthew slowly, cautiously began to accept his stepfamily's claims of strange creatures and magical beings, the second sight had exploded onto him in a burst of waxy-orange taste and strange, indistinct flickers at the edge of his peripheral vision. Arthur had explained to him that 'the creatures of the Otherworld are shy; they don't normally trust humans, and only reveal themselves to someone they know they can trust." The fact Matthew and François's second sights were noticeably weaker than Arthur and Alfred's was all a matter of trust; "the faeries just don't trust you guys as much yet," Alfred had said.

_Tap, tap, tap, tap…_

Alfred, Arthur, François and Matthew all simultaneously stiffened, the previous conversation forgotten. Silhouetted by the wavering lights of the streetlamps outside, two small faeries fluttered at the glass, flittering as quick as nighttime moths. If he squinted, Matthew could just make out their tiny faces, pinched in scowls as they beat the windowpane with miniscule fists, demanding entry.

Arthur snuck a worried glance at François. Alfred sank silently further down into his chair. Matthew looked from Arthur to Alasdair and swallowed. If Alasdair noticed the tapping noises…

"Oh, so the Seelie have decided to fly in, huh?" Alasdair noticed, glancing at the window, and simultaneously sending the table into an uproar.

François looked flabbergasted. "You have the second sight?"

Arthur was on his feet in an instant. "Since when?"

Alfred just looked back and forth between the adults while Matthew quietly whispered, "What are the Seelie?"

Alasdair's lips curved upwards in a small grin as he glanced at Matthew. "The Seelie are a court of Otherworld fae. They're quite forgiving when it comes to us mortals; they've been known to help humans out." Having said that, he stretched back in his chair and yawned, rumpling his already messy hair.

Matthew blinked. Arthur had never mentioned anything about the Otherworld having specific clans or groups; Matthew assumed they all just drifted around on their own devices. "O… oh."

How did Alasdair know about the Otherworld?

Arthur stared at his brother with something like incredulity. "Since when were you the authority on the fae?"

Alasdair raised an eyebrow insolently, and something like darkness swam to the foreground of those olive-green eyes, making Matthew shiver. "Well, I figured since my dear brother's started an occult shop, I might as well do a bit of researching on my own." His voice held a definite icy tinge, and he concluded the statement with an air that suggested he wasn't willing to go any further with the topic.

"Oh... right." Arthur blinked and relented, sinking back down into his chair. "Fair enough."

François coughed quietly into a fist, attracting Matthew's attention. The willowy blonde man didn't look as though he had been listening to the conversation at all, instead staring at the faeries silhouetted behind the glass with something like pity. "I think they want to come in." He got up. "Arthur, do we have some…?"

Arthur pointed in the direction of the kitchen. "The milk's in the fridge."

Matthew tried to tell himself this was nothing but a normal event, even as François poured the milk into a large bowl and headed for the door. Matthew almost instantly dismissed the thought, watching in awe as the two faeries soared inside.

There was nothing special about the faeries' arrival. A childhood of various Disney films had prepared Matthew for something spectacular; a trail of sparks, perhaps, or a radiant golden glow. The lack of anything happening made Matthew feel slightly disappointed, even as the two faeries alighted on the rim of the bowl.

François blinked dazedly down at the two faeries, looking awestruck. The room was silent. Matthew couldn't take his eyes off the scene in front of him. Alfred gaped at the two faeries for several moments before turning to Matthew, eyes shining. "This is amazing!" he mouthed.

Matthew opened his mouth, about to reply, when, having drunk its fill, one of the faeries rose into the air and flitted over to him. It grew so close to him his eyes watered form the strain of trying to see it. His skin crawled, the wax-orange scent clogged his nostrils, and short filaments of electricity danced on the tips of his fingers. Frightened, he wondered what he could do, and looked to Arthur for advice. He nodded, and Matthew reached out. The faerie blinked at him and alighted on the end of his outstretched hand. Matthew's eyes widened. Alfred's jaw dropped.

"Careful," Arthur murmured, while François gaped and Alasdair raised his eyebrows, impressed.

Slowly, Matthew turned back to the faerie, excitement coursing through his veins. "Hello." he whispered.

The faerie blinked again and rose into the air, flying out of the door behind its companion in a whir of glittering wings. Once the fae had successfully flown outside, Arthur burst into applause, ruffling his stepson's hair. "Well done, Matthew!"

Matthew blinked and smiled. The electric tingling sensation he had experienced during the fae's short visit was fading quickly from his skin, lending everything a surreal, dream-like quality. "That was…" he looked down at his hand where the faerie had rested, and shook his head in wonderment. "Wow."

"You know, I think you have a gift," François remarked.

Matthew's mouth drooped at the sight of Alfred's expression; slapped-around-the-face- shock transforming into rage and hurt in the blink of an eye. He quickly decided to be diplomatic. "No, Alfred's much better at seeing the fae than me." He coupled the sentence with a breezy laugh, and was rewarded by Alfred's expression brightening.

Alasdair smiled.

**ooOOoo**

The bright streetlights of L'Autoroute Verte glided past at a leisurely pace of sixty miles an hour, winking behind the glass like demented fireflies. The long shadows cast by the streetlamps bordering the road slid their sinuous black fingers over the vintage model's bulk, tinging the brown paintwork inky black in the parts not brightened by the static orange glare. Few cars were out and about to join the Fiat at this time of the morning, leaving the oncoming roads and twisting, dizzying loops of the motorway blissfully silent and still.

In the passenger seat of the Fiat, Matthew fiddled with his earphones, trying not to notice the faded sepia photograph resting beside him, no matter how tauntingly the constantly shifting patterns of light and shade danced across it. The photograph of him, François and Felicia had fallen from its customary position on the dashboard hours ago, yet he felt in no mood to pick it up. There were too many memories associated with that picture and disturbing or acknowledging it would only bring them back to the forefront of his mind, where he had tried hard to expel them from for the majority of his trip from Dijon. Turning off his iPhone, he jerked his head back to the road, successfully blocking the image in the fuzzy non-awareness beyond his peripheral vision and fumbled for the radio knob, more to distract himself than anything else.

"Can I turn on the radio?"

François barely glanced at him, gaze fixed on the darkened road ahead. "Sure."

Classical music crackled through the morose stillness of the car, and Matthew breathed a quick sigh of relief. He didn't think he would have been able to cope with the news, with all its doom-laden reports.

Soaring violins and poignant, reedy flutes accompanied the rumble of the tyres as he drove, steadily losing the dense, house-lined streets for wider, lush fields. The sun was just beginning to tentatively edge its way beneath the horizon, brushing the heavy grey autumn clouds with a thin red light. Soon the sun would sink in earnest, bathing the land in a wash of dark hues, signifying the start of a new night.

By the time they reached Montbéliard, the night was dark. The evening rolled in like fog from the river, blurring everything into a muted tapestry of darkened colours. The car's engine thrummed dully as François brought it to a halt outside the gate of the house, the exhaust pipe shuddering in protest.

The house looked exactly the same as Matthew remembered. Tall black iron gates topped by cross-shaped patterns framed the large house beyond. A wide cream stone path bordered by red brick led from the gates up to the grey stone steps. The front lawn was immaculately clipped and dotted with a healthy amount of flourishing flower gardens, each boasting singularly unique conflagrations of colour and vibrancy, although dimmed now in the less-than-flattering darkness. The house itself was a roughly rectangular structure, with plain white-washed walls and majestic, arching wood-framed windows. The roof was a tall apex made of weathered red-brown terracotta shingles, furred with moss and cracked unpleasantly in some places.

"What does Felicia's husband do, again?" Matthew asked in a hushed voice as he unbuckled his seatbelt.

"Ludwig's a doctor," François explained as he got out, slinging his bag over his shoulder. Glancing up at the house he added, with a small sniff, "And a well-paid one, apparently."

They walked up to the door. Walking further ahead than his father, Matthew raised his fist to knock at the door, but his hand stilled several centimetres above the wood, unable to close the gap. Something considerably larger than butterflies – more like jellyfish - spun backflips in his stomach, and Matthew closed his eyes.

"I can't do this…"

François squeezed his shoulder comfortingly. "Vas-y, mon chéri. I know this might feel strange, but you won't get anything accomplished by waiting."

Matthew opened his eyes, and nodded once. "Okay."

_Knock, knock, knock._

The three knocks seemed to echo in the stillness of the night, bringing to Matthew's mind the unpleasant image of a deserted haunted house. Matthew relaxed as footsteps sounded from inside, before the door was yanked back.

"Wie heissich? Löhn si mi in ruh?"

A blonde man dressed in camouflage jeans and combat boots was standing in the doorway, holding a shotgun aimed directly between Matthew's eyes.

To be continued…


End file.
